COBOL-IT, the first company to provide an enterprise-class Open Source COBOL Compiler has selected ESI as the first Technical Hub in the U.S.A.

Paris 28 January, 2010 – Today COBOL-IT and ESI announced that ESI, already a distributor of the COBOL-IT® Compiler Suite, has qualified as a Technical Hub to become the primary support site for U.S. and Canadian companies deploying the best-in-breed Open Source COBOL suite. To qualify, ESI has demonstrated that, in addition to providing enterprise class technical support for the COBOL-IT® Compiler Suite, it can engage with COBOL-IT users to add significant value for customer projects. Through its own resources, COBOL-IT products, and the eco-system of COBOL-IT partners across the globe, ESI can provide a complete solution to significant technical challenges in COBOL applications.

“ESI has consistently provided high quality support to COBOL users for over 35 years, always as a partner to their customers,” says Stephane Croce CEO at COBOL-IT. “COBOL continues to be the dominant language for mission critical applications, and now this demanding market is showing great interest in open source solutions as a way of ensuring cost effective and reliable applications.”

“This is an exciting opportunity for the market,” said Sean Murphy, Product Director of COBOL-IT at ESI. “COBOL-IT provides a fully supported 21st century COBOL compiler with highest-quality US based support. The COBOL-IT eco-system will enable ESI to partner with our customers to provide low cost/high quality solutions for application modernization, integration of open source databases, COBOL friendly XML interface, automated documentation, and maintenance cost reduction, among many other capabilities.”

About COBOL-IT
COBOL-IT is the first company offering an enterprise-class Open Source COBOL Compiler with a wide range of Premium Professional Services. The COBOL-IT® Compiler Suite software is an advanced and specific distribution of the COBOL compiler. COBOL-IT is positioned as a partner for companies with mission critical COBOL applications that must be maintained or modernized. The COBOL-IT software range covers all the life cycle aspects of COBOL application: development, modernization, maintenance and production. In addition to its software offering, COBOL-IT proposes a wide range of commercial subscriptions, professional services and advice regarding COBOL usage and related tools.
The COBOL-IT® Compiler Suite, which is certified by Microsoft, Oracle, IBM, HP, Sun, RedHat, MySQL and many others, offers a full range of supporting products and services to professional IT organizations of all sizes on current Microsoft, Unix and Linux platforms.

About ESI
ESI Services, LLC was originally founded in 1973 as a worldwide provider of programming tools, systems software, and support services. It has been providing COBOL-specific tools and enterprise class support ever since for users on mainframe and open systems platforms.

COBOL-IT® Compiler Suite and COBOL-IT® registered trademarks or trademarks of COBOL-IT in the EU.

For more information, press only:

Sean Murphy, (850) 575-0179, smurphy@esiusa.com

For more information on COBOL-IT® Compiler Suite,
http://www.esiusa.com/cobol-it.aspx

For more information on COBOL-IT,